"Are you crazy?" he said, as she stood before him, fierce and panting for breath.
"No," she answered, drawing so close to him that her white face almost touched his; "but you are worse than that--stark, staring mad, I tell you--when you expect to even me with any other girl."
"Even you with any other girl!" said Storms, really startled. "As if any one ever thought of it! Why, one would think you never heard of a joke before!"
"A joke?--a joke?"
"Yes, you foolish child, you beautiful fiend--a joke on my part, but something more with the miserable old gossips that have gotten up stories to torment you. As if you had not had enough of their lies!"
Judith drew a deep breath, and looked at him with all the pitiful intensity of a dumb animal recovering from a blow.
"They seemed to be in earnest. They said that you were about to marry some girl of your mother"s choosing."
"Well, what then? That was reason enough why you should have laughed at it."
"But you hesitated. You looked at me with a wicked smile."
"No wonder. Who could help laughing at such folly?"
"Folly--is it folly? Just now your face is pale, but when I look at you a hot red comes about your eyes. I don"t like it--I don"t like it!"
"Is it strange that a sensible fellow can"t help blushing when the girl he loves makes a fool of herself?"
Judith looked in that keen, sinister face with misgiving; but Storms had gained full command of his countenance now, and met her scrutiny with a smile.
"Come, come," he said, "no more of this nonsense. There isn"t any such girl as you are dreaming of in the world."
"Oh, Richard, _are_ you telling me the truth?" questioned the girl, clasping her hands, and reaching them out with a gesture of wild entreaty.
"The truth, and nothing but the truth, on my honor--on my soul!"
A fragment of rock half imbedded in the earth lay near Judith. She sunk down upon it, dashed both hands up to her face, and burst into a wild pa.s.sion of weeping that shook her from head to foot.
The young man stood apart, regarding her with mingled astonishment and dismay. Up to this time she had been scarcely more than an overgrown child in his estimation, but this outgush of strength, wrath, and tears bespoke something sterner and more unmanageable than that--something that he must appease and guard against, or mischief might come of it.
He approached her with more of respect in his manner than it had ever exhibited before, and said, in a low, conciliatory tone:
"Come, Judith, now that you know this story to be all lies, what are you crying about? Don"t you see that it is getting dark? What will your father think?"
Judith dashed the tears from her eyes, and, taking his arm, clung to it lovingly as she went toward home.
CHAPTER XI.
PROTEST AND APPEAL.
"Father, father, do not ask me to meet him; from the first it was an evil engagement, broken, or should have been. Why do you wish to take it up again?"
Ruth Jessup, who made this appeal, stood in front of her father, who had just told her that it had been arranged that a speedy marriage should terminate the engagement with Richard Storms--an engagement entered into when she was scarcely more than a child. "It was high time the thing was settled," he said, "while neighbor Storms was pleased with his son and ready to settle a handsome property on him.
That, with the money that would be hers in time, might enable them to move among the best in the neighborhood."
The girl listened to all this with a wild look in her face, half-rebellion, half-terror. "No," she said, straining her hands together in a pa.s.sionate clasp, "you must not ask me to take him. I could not love him--the very idea is dreadful."
"But, girl, you are engaged to him. My word is given--my word is given."
"But only on condition, father--only on the condition of his amendment."
"Well, the young man has come through his probation like a gentleman, as he has a right to be. He just rode by here on his bay horse, as fine a looking young fellow as one need want for a son-in-law, lifting his hat like a lord as he pa.s.sed me. We may expect him here to-night."
"But, father, I will not see him. I--I cannot."
The girl was pale and anxious; her eyes were eloquent with pleading, her mouth tremulous.
"And why not?"
"Only I cannot--I never can like him again."
The kind-hearted gardener sat down in the nearest chair, and took those two clasped hands in his, looking gravely but very kindly into the girl"s troubled face.
"Daughter," he said, "workingmen don"t pretend to fine sentiments, but we have our own ideas of honor, and a man"s word once given in good faith must be kept, let the cost be what it may. I have given my word to neighbor Storms. It must be honestly redeemed. You made no objection then."
"But, oh, father, I was so young! How could I know what an awful thing I was doing?"
"If it was a mistake, who but ourselves should suffer for it, Ruth?"
"But he went astray--his company was of the worst."
"That is all changed and atoned for."
The girl shook her head.
"Oh, father, he was never a good son."
"That, too, is changed; no man was ever more proud of a son than neighbor Storms is now of this young man."
The girl turned away and began to cry.
"I thought you had given this up--that I should never again be tormented with it! He seemed willing to leave me alone; but now only three weeks after my G.o.dmother has promised to give me her money he comes back again! Oh, I wish she had promised it to some one else!"
"That is the very reason why we should fulfil our obligations to the letter, Ruth. It must not be said that a child of mine drew back from her father"s plighted word because her dower promised to be more than double anything he had counted on when it was given."
The girl"s eyes flashed and her lips curved.
"If it has made him more eager, I may well consider it," she said; "and I think it has."